It goes with­out say­ing that I have been rather suc­cess­ful when it comes to try­ing out Nigella Lawson’s recipes.  She has this ten­dency to make prac­ti­cal recipes that will make you feel like a culi­nary diva.  Dur­ing my can’t cook my way out of a paper bag period, I remem­ber watch­ing her show “Nigella Bites” on the Style net­work and she did this “Coca Cola Ham.”  For the hol­i­days this year, I decided to be adven­tur­ous and try to make my first ham – of course flash­ing back to one of the first recipes that made me think “hey – I could do that!”

Thank­fully, I had Coke already in the pantry for enter­tain­ing along with many of the ingre­di­ents so off I went on Christ­mas Eve to get the ham and the Eng­lish Mus­tard (thank GOD for the British sec­tion at Gen­uardis!)  I didn’t think about the logis­tics about cook­ing the ham as I real­ized I ini­tially had to BOIL the immense ham and this gal doesn’t have a 7.5 qt. Le Creuset (I know, shame on me, right?)  Thank­fully, I did have a stock pot and I used that but I had no idea HOW I was going to get the ham out of the pot.  My well stocked gad­get drawer was sans turkey lifters or a carv­ing set.  *sigh*  No wor­ries, I thought as I tried to Mac­Gyver it with tongs, a skim­mer and some other instru­ment ala an octo­pus and, next thing you know, *boom* I had boil­ing Coke run­ning down my right arm and was cov­ered in the hot sticky goo.   Thank­fully, the only injury was to me as the ham and most of of the coca cola stock was saved from disaster.

My arm, how­ever, had me think­ing back to my ini­tial restau­rant days – under cold water it went.  Thank­fully, I keep a first aid kit of sorts in the kitchen and imme­di­ately went to grab this fab­u­lous burn cream, Burn Cream MD,  that a thought­ful pub­li­cist sent me some time ago.  I hon­estly believe that this cream is a god­send and is a must for every kitchen – it helped relieve the sting­ing and itch­ing and, here it is 3 weeks later and you could barely tell that my arm was red­der than Rudolph’s nose on Christ­mas.  Les­son learned – I have plans on get­ting the proper tools before I cook this ham again.

I have to say that every­one should try this recipe at least once.  The ham was so fla­vor­ful and the mustard/muscovado sugar crust had the per­fect spicy & sweet fla­vor.  Nigella truly is the workin’ gal’s Domes­tic Goddess!

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Coca Cola Ham

Recipe adapted from Nigella Lawson

Ingre­di­ents:

For the Ham:

• 1 (4 1/4 to 4 1/2-pound) bone in ham
• 1 onion, peeled, cut in 1/2
• 1 (2-liter) bot­tle cola (rec­om­mended: Coca-Cola)

For the Glaze:

• 1 hand­ful cloves (Note: I used 1 tbsp. of ground cloves)
• 1 heap­ing table­spoon molasses
• 2 tea­spoons Eng­lish mus­tard powder
• 2 table­spoons Demer­ara (raw cane sugar) or gran­u­lated brown sugar (Note: I used 2 table­spoons of Mus­co­v­ado sugar that I had in the pantry in lieu of the molasses/sugar combo)
• 1 table­spoon of Dijon mus­tard (Note:  My addition)

Direc­tions:

Peel and cut 1 onion in half.  Place the ham in a large pot or Dutch oven along with the onion and pour the Coca-Cola over the ham.  Do NOT use diet – you must go with the tried and true old fash­ioned coca-cola for this recipe.  On a medium-high heat, allow to cola to come to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and cover, not tightly with lid, and allow to cook for 2 1/2 hours. It is 1 hour for every 2 pounds.

Pre­heat oven to 500 degrees F.

Pull the ham from the pot, and allow to rest on a cut­ting board reserv­ing the cook­ing liq­uid. Using a sharp knife, trim the skin, leav­ing a thin layer of fat on the ham. Using the knife, score the fat diag­o­nally into large dia­mond cut.. In each dia­mond pierce the fat with 1 clove. Spread the molasses over the meat. Gen­tly pat the pow­dered mus­tard and sugar around the meat, so it sticks to the molasses. Line a roast­ing pan with alu­minum foil. Gen­tly place the ham in the roast­ing pan. Cook the ham for about 10 min­utes or until glaze is bur­nished and bubbly.

For brais­ing the ham in advance and then let­ting the ham cool, take ham from the refrig­er­a­tor, glaze it accord­ing to the recipe, and give it 30 to 40 min­utes to sit at room tem­per­a­ture. Place in a 350 degree F oven for 30 to 40 min­utes, then turn­ing up the heat if you think it needs a more crispy exterior.

Gather the ingredients

Time to boil

Prepar­ing the Glaze

Off to the roast­ing rack – burn be damned!

Time for Dinner…